Looks like Ben has 2 years left on his deal after this one. His cap number will be 18 Mill+ next year. He is owed 23 mill over next two years. Sounds like choices after this season will be either extend or release/trade.

I expected another 5 years from him, but he seems to be getting old faster than most. I still think he is an upper level QB in the league, but he doesn't seem to have gotten the wisdom that is supposed to come with age. And his mojo for comebacks seems to be gone. they mentioned 28 4th quarter comebacks in his career. I'll bet about 75% of those were in the first 5 years.

I have no doubt that 2014 would be worse without him than with him, but how much money can the Steelers afford to throw at him?

Do we extend and hope to get 3 years out of him, then take the cap hit from a release?

Could we get worthwhile trade value in the offseason?

Moot point because I suspect Steelers will give him an extension, but just wondering what thoughts are.

It is time to start planning, but I feel he's still a capable QB. And having a plus player at that position is an absolute must in the NFL, especially now. Otherwise you're depending on extreme luck. I bet they extend him pretty soon. Unless they feel he's gotten fat and happy. Who knows?

Logged

"I like David Bowie, he was always my favorite member of Tin Machine."- Rodney Anonymous

Trading is a very, very touchy situation. If you put feelers out there and don't end up moving him, it'll create a lot of acrimony. It would also have to be for a top 10 (maybe even top 5) pick, at a minimum...with a future pick too. Top 5 in 2014 and R2 in 2015 might get it done.

He's owed 23MIL, but I think his cap hit for the remainder is closer to 36MIL. That's a lotta dead money against the cap during the next two seasons. Maybe they luck into a rook QB that can produce right outta the gate, but who knows if he ends up being a Luck/Newton or a Gabbert/Locker.

Reserving my spot in this thread for a response in about a month. See what things look like at that point.

No, and in my opinion, he's still an elite quarterback, or close to one. Before anyone runs him out of town too early, remember this: odds are that he is, still, today, on this shitty 2-5 team, better than any QB we're going to have in the next 25 to 30 years. Look around the league. There just aren't that many good ones.

The real problems with this offense is that the offensive line is a nightmare and the receivers are terrible. Ben's had several TD passes dropped this season. He's still got very good awareness of the pass rush, and the ability to make plays when they breakdown.

Todd Haley is another problem, although even with him, I'd say it's hard to run any offense when the blocking and protection are this ridiculously terrible. Keep in mind, not only do teams beat our line play after play, but they can expect to do so, which means they can also, when situations call for it, take risks that they wouldn't against other teams. I know everyone complains about all the screens and draw plays, but I can understand the logic behind it, too. Every play that requires more than 2 seconds of blocking turns into a Chinese fire drill. I seriously doubt that a committee of the top 5 offensive minds in football, if they suddenly worked for us, would see appreciably better results.

Ben has his flaws, to be sure, and if you watch the all-22 on game rewind you'll observe that he doesn't see open guys from time to time. He also doesn't manage the game as much as he perhaps should, such as taking off and running for 3 yards or just throwing the ball away.

I believed that in the offseason we should have invested as much as we could in skill position players on offense. I would have liked to see use all of our first three picks on WRs, RBs, and/or TEs, depending on whoever was highest on our board at those positions. We are woeful in all three places, and depth is particularly embarrassing. David Paulson is our second TE, and he should not be on any NFL team's practice squad. Our RBs after Bell would not be on a roster if not for us. We have one competent WR.

Cutting an expensive, replaceable vet to get a competent free agent or two at the skill positions would have helped, too. Our plan going in should have been to make an offense that can score some points with the expectation that the defense is in decline, and then win with shootouts and maybe some intelligent scheming and experience on D. Instead, we tried to solve every little problem with this draft instead of bombarding the glaring weakness among the positions that put points on the board.

Todd Haley is another problem, although even with him, I'd say it's hard to run any offense when the blocking and protection are this ridiculously terrible. Keep in mind, not only do teams beat our line play after play, but they can expect to do so, which means they can also, when situations call for it, take risks that they wouldn't against other teams. I know everyone complains about all the screens and draw plays, but I can understand the logic behind it, too. Every play that requires more than 2 seconds of blocking turns into a Chinese fire drill. I seriously doubt that a committee of the top 5 offensive minds in football, if they suddenly worked for us, would see appreciably better results.

I believed that in the offseason we should have invested as much as we could in skill position players on offense. I would have liked to see use all of our first three picks on WRs, RBs, and/or TEs, depending on whoever was highest on our board at those positions. We are woeful in all three places, and depth is particularly embarrassing. David Paulson is our second TE, and he should not be on any NFL team's practice squad. Our RBs after Bell would not be on a roster if not for us. We have one competent WR.

Cutting an expensive, replaceable vet to get a competent free agent or two at the skill positions would have helped, too. Our plan going in should have been to make an offense that can score some points with the expectation that the defense is in decline, and then win with shootouts and maybe some intelligent scheming and experience on D. Instead, we tried to solve every little problem with this draft instead of bombarding the glaring weakness among the positions that put points on the board.

Nothing in that plan would have addressed the biggest problem that you mentioned in the first quote above though. Also, I think Dwyer actually does make a pretty good backup RB to Bell. I don't mind pushing that back in draft priority now (probably to third day). Dwyer's not going to set the world on fire if he comes in, but if your horse gets dinged he can come in a play the rest of the game if he needs to. Starting quality RBs aren't backups.

My plan would be to address the line in much the same way that you mentioned. Make a bunch of quality picks at OL and sort out the depth chart during practices. If the line is good enough, it doesn't matter so much who is running behind it.

Logged

OK Chris. Now that we have practiced kissing and cuddling, we'll practice eating out...at a fancy restaurant.

Pretty close. Looking over the numbers, we can thank Omar for that: restructured $600K/5 years in 2011 + $10.7M/4 in 2012 + $9M/3 in 2013 = "Misc." bonus monies of $5.8M each of the next two in addition to the salary. Robbing the future to pay for extensions of the past. Well done. Works when the old fuckers are contributing commensurately to their salaries. Is Woodley providing us with $9M worth of bang for our buck this year? Pola for $10M? Keisel and Clark $5M each? Hood and Heyward are taking up $5M combined, and we're questioning whether Hood is a bust and whether Heyward (in his 3rd year) might be showing signs of progress. When you're not getting ROI from the vets and your draft picks are increasingly shaky, bad things happen. The salary cap balancing act only works when you absolutely get it right consistently.

I wouldn't trust this FO in any sort of trade involving Ben, if one could be negotiated. It sounds reasonable enough: reunite Ben and Arians in Arizona, e.g., shed salary and draft the next great chapter. Our luck, Ben wins two more rings and whoever we take busts out.

This is a rich year for QBs, so that has a two-fold effect. It pushes down quality players at other positions of need (OT and WR and CB notably), meaning we can find better value. Also might find a better developmental QB than Landry, although my best guess is that TomBert will keep him around another year and then dump him, go back to the draft in another QB-bereft class. Actually, any year's strengths we tend to go against what's deep, so we probably won't even draft a WR or QB at all this year. CB looks deep at the top too, so hells, we'll wait until R6 or some shit there.